


The Devil All The Time

by LeafyGreenQueen773



Series: NaNoWriMo 2018 [1]
Category: Deadpool - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017)
Genre: Abstinence, Catholic Peter Parker, M/M, Masturbation, Masturbation Abstinence, No Sex, No Slash, Peter Parker Has a Crush, Peter Parker Loves Wade Wilson, Peter Parker Needs a Hug, Peter Parker and Wade Wilson First Meet, Peter Parker feels guilty, Peter and Wade Don't Do Anything, Peter is fifteen, Self-Denial, Wade Wilson Has Advice
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-19
Updated: 2018-11-19
Packaged: 2019-08-25 19:45:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,796
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16667122
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LeafyGreenQueen773/pseuds/LeafyGreenQueen773
Summary: AU: Peter doesn't have powers, but Wade does.Peter Parker was raised Catholic by his parents, and Uncle Ben took up the gauntlet of taking Peter to mass every Sunday.  Now that Ben is gone, Peter feels guilty all the time.  His emerging sexuality doesn't help.Excerpt: Peter slipped a hand under the waistband of his pajama pants; he was already hard, and sensitive.  The moment he wrapped his hand around himself, he felt a bead of moisture drip out of him.“Oh God,” he murmured into the darkness.Guilt surged into his chest.With a groan, Peter pulled his hand out of his pants and grabbed onto the sheet instead.  He turned onto his side and forced himself to close his eyes.





	The Devil All The Time

**Author's Note:**

> Hey everyone!  
> This story was brewing ever since they announced that Tom Holland was going to be in a film next year called "The Devil All the Time," which, no matter what the movie is about, is a FANTASTIC title. As someone who was raised Catholic, I have felt my fair share of guilt over certain things, and my budding sexuality and desire was one of those things that really fucked me up as a teenager. That's why I had to write about fifteen-year-old Catholic boy Peter, struggling to come to terms with all the guilt in his life, especially over Uncle Ben's death and over whether or not he's allowed to feel pleasure or explore himself. These were real things that affected my teenage years and shaped me as a person. Even after I stopped being Catholic, the guilt still ate at me. So it's very real.
> 
> Peter is fifteen in this fic, but he and Wade do NOT have a relationship. The reason that I put a slash relationship there is because Peter does have a crush on Wade (who is an adult) and he does fantasize about him, but Wade does not engage in sexual behavior with Peter, and this is not about an underage relationship.
> 
> Please leave comments if you want! Sorry if there are typos; I really didn't do much editing here since I banged this fic out for NaNoWriMo.

_Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee._

_Blessed are thou amongst women,_

_And blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus._

_Holy Mary, Mother of God,_

_Pray for us sinners,_

_Now, and at the hour of our death._

_Amen._

 

_Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee._

_Blessed are thou amongst women,_

_And blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus._

_Holy Mary, Mother of God,_

_Pray for us sinners,_

_Now, and at the hour of our death._

_Amen._

 

_Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee._

_Blessed are thou amongst women,_

_And blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus._

_Holy Mary, Mother of God,_

_Pray for us sinners,_

_Now, and at the hour of our death._

_Amen._

 

_Hail Mary..._

 

Peter's hand started to cramp slightly as he feverishly scribbled into his notebook. It was a good sort of ache, the kind that took his mind off everything else except what he was writing and how it was making his hand sore. He continued to write, copying down the prayer four times, five times, twenty times, until his hand was so angry that the pen shook in his fingers. Finally, he put the pen down on the desk, sat back in his chair, and kneaded the muscles in his hand with his opposite thumb.

The clock on his desk was ticking loudly, commanding him to pay attention to how late it was getting.

“I'm sorry,” he muttered, though there was no one else in the room. Then, satisfied that his hand wasn't going to feel better anytime soon, he pushed his chair away from the desk, stood up, and went to the bathroom to brush his teeth.

Eyes with dark circles from doing homework into the wee hours of the morning stared back at him in the mirror as he filled his mouth with the minty foam. He was so tired that he rocked back and forth slightly while he held the toothbrush between his teeth, barely brushing at all.

A dribble of liquified toothpaste slipped down his chin, and he opened his eyes, not even remembering shutting them in the first place.

Even against his pale face, the toothpaste on his skin stood out, running down until it hung at the bottom edge of his jaw, quivered for a second, and dripped down onto the counter.

He stared at the drop, then swiped away the rest from his chin, yanked the toothbrush out of his mouth, and spit.

With shaking hands, he wiped his face off with a white towel.

 

~~~

 

Peter hadn't known anyone else to have a childhood quite like his. He'd lived with his ultra-religious parents until they both died in a car accident. At just ten years old, Peter had gone to live with his aunt and uncle, two of the most loving, progressive, and accepting people he'd ever met. As such, he'd always had a strange relationship with religion, society, and his own concept of his faith. Although he had grown to accept a variety of things that weren't generally allowed in strict Christianity, such as LGBTQA+ people, women's choice on pregnancy, and people celebrating other religions, there was one thing that he'd always struggled with. That was forgiving himself.

Although Aunt May and Uncle Ben weren't Catholic, they had understood that Peter's parents were Catholic and had wanted him to follow the same path. So every Sunday morning, from the day he arrived to live with his aunt and uncle, Uncle Ben had gotten up, gotten Peter dressed in his best clothes, and walked him down the street to the nearby church. Peter was old enough to take communion, and when he was old enough to be enrolled in confirmation classes, Uncle Ben had signed the papers. He was confirmed on a cloudy, cold day in April, and he remembered the strange sense of calm that he'd felt when the anointing oil slid down from his forehead to the bridge of his nose.

Sometimes he wondered where that comfort had gone.

Now, as he lay in bed, staring up at the underside of the top bunk, he could feel the curiosity boiling up inside him, unable to be tramped down by prayers or self-loathing.

He closed his eyes, willing himself to fall asleep on the spot, but it seemed that the drowsiness that had almost put him to sleep while brushing his teeth was a distant memory. Instead, he felt like he was almost outside of his own body, like there was nothing tethering him to the bed except the knowledge that he was there.

Peter slipped a hand under the waistband of his pajama pants; he was already hard, and sensitive. The moment he wrapped his hand around himself, he felt a bead of moisture drip out of him.

“Oh God,” he murmured into the darkness.

Guilt surged into his chest.

With a groan, Peter pulled his hand out of his pants and grabbed onto the sheet instead. He turned onto his side and forced himself to close his eyes.

Sleep came in fitful bursts, and when he finally managed to sink into unconsciousness for more than a few minutes, he dreamed of some figure, without any defining characteristics other than that of a tall, muscular human. The figure sank onto the bed behind him and pulled Peter into its arms.

He woke up hard, and the front of his pants was damp.

 

~~~

 

 

After Uncle Ben's death, Peter had taken a short break from church. It was too painful to sit down in the pew where they had always taken their seats, and it was too hard to remember how he'd circled back around to Uncle Ben after his confirmation, grinning, beaming, oil dripping down his face, and seen his uncle with his camera, looking proud. It didn't matter that Uncle Ben hadn't been Catholic – it had only mattered that Peter did something he'd wanted to do.

Only about a month into his break from church, however, he got a personal phone call from one of the parishioners who had supported him during his confirmation classes. She was a kind, older lady, who had a couple grown sons of her own. Peter had sat on his bed, listening to her sympathize with him about losing Uncle Ben. She'd concluded her call by telling him that he really ought to come back to church, and talk to the priest.

He'd ended up on the other side of a screen, coaxed into talking about his sins. All he wanted to say was that he felt like he'd had a hand in Uncle Ben's death, that he hadn't done enough to protect the man who had become his father figure over the last five years. But the words were stuck in his throat, and he found himself spouting out trivial things instead: he'd snapped at a bully at school, he hadn't listened to his aunt when she'd told him to do the dishes, and he'd missed four weeks of mass.

“Anything else?” the priest's voice had asked.

“I – ” Peter swallowed. _I should tell him that I feel like I killed my uncle._ “I.”

“Don't be afraid to tell God the truth.”

“I...” He couldn't say it. He was a coward. But he had to say something. “I...guess I touch myself, sometimes.”

The priest seemed uninterested, and Peter realized that it was probably something he heard from teenage boys all the time. “A common enough sin, but deriving pleasure like that is using the gift of your sexuality for the wrong reasons. It's important to remember that your body is for a greater purpose, and masturbation is abusing your own body. It turns the mind inward, and makes you selfish. Removing this sin from your life will bring you closer to God.”

“What's my penance?” Peter squeaked.

“Twenty 'Hail Mary's. You may find that meditating on this prayer helps you abstain.”

Then Peter had said the final prayer with the priest, and it was time to slip out of the door. He scurried around the corner before the priest could see that it had been him in the other side of the confessional chamber.

Other people were filing in for mass, and although Peter had intended to stay, he couldn't bring himself to sit alone in the pew. He was afraid to open the hymnal that was tucked into the back of the seat ahead. Maybe Uncle Ben had written in it, or left his mark somehow. It was overwhelming just to think that his uncle had touched it, had sat there, singing with Peter through a mass every Sunday, although he wasn't Catholic.

Instead of staying for the mass, Peter had shoved his hands in his pockets, turned around, and left the church, passing by a marble angel statue on the way out.

 

~~~

 

 

The six-month anniversary of Uncle Ben's death fell on a Sunday. Peter didn't go to church.

Instead, he and Aunt May went to a movie, a matinee at the local theater, in the hopes of getting cheap tickets that would distract them both. It was a historical drama about someone Peter had never heard of previously, but he wasn't all that stellar in history.

The movie was good, but it was almost ruined by a man sitting two rows back from Peter and May. He was probably the most annoying movie-goer Peter had ever experienced – he was chewing his popcorn at an excruciating volume, and he kept laughing during the film, which had very few funny moments.

If it had been any other day, Peter wouldn't have cared, but instead of letting it go, Peter found himself dwelling on the way that the man was causing Aunt May to frown beside him.

Finally, when the movie let out, Peter dragged behind for a moment. The man that had been laughing came tripping down the aisle, as though he were a little kid. He sucked his soda dry as Peter held up his hand to stop him.

Before Peter could get a word out, the man stepped forward a little into better lighting, and Peter suddenly saw that the man's face was completely scarred, from his chin, over his lips, to where his eyebrows should have been, and disappearing into the hood of his sweatshirt.

“Well you're just a little lost puppy, aren't you?”

The man's voice was unlike anything Peter had ever heard. It dropped straight into his jeans.

“I...” Peter cleared his throat, taking solace in the face that the theater was dark enough that his stiffening dick wouldn't be noticed. “I just wanted to say that it wasn't cool how you kept laughing during the movie. My aunt and I came here to distract ourselves, and you kinda ruined it.”

The man raised his eyebrows – or at least the flesh where his eyebrows should have been – as though he was surprised that anyone had genuinely been upset by the way he'd responded to the film. Instead of yelling at Peter, however, he pressed a large hand into Peter's shoulder. “Hey, kid, I get it. Noted. Won't happen again.”

There was a thumb digging into his collarbone, and the dim light was shining in the man's eyes, and Peter felt his dick twitch in his pants. He suppressed a shiver and tried to give a small smile. “Okay. Thanks.”

“What's your name?”

There was a small moment in which Peter wondered if he should say his name or decline to do so. But he found his mouth forming the word: “Peter.”

A grin split the man's face. “Nice to meet you, Peter. I'm Wade. Maybe I'll see you around.”

Peter spluttered a little as Wade took his hand back and slipped past Peter to get to the theater exit. The way he walked was confident and purposeful, like he had somewhere to be, and Peter could see muscles working in the man's back as he passed the garbage can and tossed his drink container in.

Aunt May was definitely waiting outside the theater for him, but Peter's erection was now demandingly hard in his jeans. He sat in one of the seats, willing it to go away. By the time the cleaning crew came in, he'd tamed it enough that he could leave without a blush burning up into his face.

 

~~~

 

Peter sat on his bed, legs crossed, books spread around. He had the Catholic Book of Prayer, he had the Catechism of the Catholic Church, he had all three versions of the Bible that he owned, and even his notebooks from faith formation classes. It was a Sunday night, his homework was done, and he wasn't going to let himself fall into his body's desires.

Even if he was half-hard just sitting there.

Peter grabbed the Catechism of the Catholic Church, flipped to a random page, and began reading. It had never been his favorite book, by any means, but that was the advantage. He was half-hoping that it was bore him into a state of non-arousal.

Instead, he found his mind wandering to Wade from the movie theater, and the way the man's hand felt on his shoulder.

Peter closed the book and set it aside, pressing it down into his mattress with frustration. “Am I gay, too?” he groaned to nobody. He was already struggling with his soul when it came to masturbating, and now he was questioning his sexuality?

What would his parents think if they saw him like this?

There was a knock at the door, and Aunt May's voice. “Peter, I've got dinner here.” She paused for a moment, before asking quietly, “Are you okay?”

Peter swiped his books to the side and lowered himself off the bed. He pulled open his bedroom door to see Aunt May standing there, looking very...alone. “Yeah, I'm fine. Are you?”

She pressed her lips together. “It's been a long day.” Then, she surged forward and pulled him into a hug. Peter wrapped his arms around his aunt and held on tightly, the way that he knew Uncle Ben always had. His parents hadn't really been huggers, but Uncle Ben had taught him that sometimes, a little physical comfort could work wonders.

“Doing a little Bible study?” Aunt May said curiously in his ear. She was looking over his shoulder into his room, and could probably see all the books and papers strewn around. Peter pulled back from the hug, but found himself unable to meet Aunt May's soft eyes.

“I'm just...I don't know, I'm kind of struggling with something and I guess I'm looking for guidance? Or something?”

“Are you finding it?”

Peter's gaze dropped to the floor between them. “I don't know.”

“Can I help with it?”

“Um. I don't know.”

A firm finger slipped under Peter's chin and tilted his face upward. “You know that Uncle Ben wouldn't want you to feel guilty, right? He would want you to understand that there is only so much you can do in this world, and the rest of it is out of our control. You do your best but you don't drive yourself crazy when you aren't perfect. Because nobody is.”

He could tell by the look in her eyes that she was talking about how he felt about Ben's death. Yet he couldn't help but almost feel like she knew about his other struggle, too. Peter pulled his aunt into a hug again, so that he wouldn't have to look into her eyes and know that she knew he was struggling with his sexuality.

They ate dinner, Uncle Ben's favorite spaghetti recipe, without talking any more on the subject.

 

~~~

 

Despite Aunt May's reassuring words, Peter still didn't feel guilt-free. He hated being fifteen, especially since he was a relatively late bloomer, and the spontaneous erections that he'd felt like his classmates were getting two years ago seemed to be hitting him now. It could also have been a product of his conscious effort not to masturbate, but the frequency at which he was popping a boner was getting a little out of hand. His week had been the week from hell at school. As such, he'd turned down Ned's invitation to hang out, and opted to go to Saturday evening mass instead.

Although the service didn't start until 5:00, Peter pulled on his jacket around 4:00, tucked his rosary into his pocket, grabbed his keys and phone, and left his apartment with the full intent to get to mass more than a half-hour early. Some parishioners would show up with plenty of time beforehand, and at 4:30, they'd start to pray the rosary. He'd heard someone say one time that it seemed a bit cult-like, but there was something soothing about being surrounded by people chanting the same thing over and over again. Plus it helped him do his penance of twenty Hail Mary's without the ache of it settling into his hand.

The church was a little over a mile away, and the movie theater was just a few blocks shy of the church, so sometimes Peter would check the posters to see which films were playing on his walk. Today, however, he slowed down by the movie theater for another reason entirely.

Wade was standing outside, smoking a cigarette, leaning against the brick of the building like some kind of character from a western flick.

He saw Peter just a second after Peter saw him.

“Well, hey, if it isn't the little lost puppy. Coming to see a movie all by your lonesome?”

Maybe Wade thought he looked like he was from a western, too. “Um, no, I'm...actually I'm walking to church.”

Wade slowly pulled the cigarette out of his mouth and lowered it to his side. “No shit? That's so pious.”

“Um. Thanks?”

For a moment, Wade seemed to be thinking deeply about something, his gaze glued to some invisible focal point over Peter's head. Then, he licked his fingers, pinched his cigarette out, and stuffed the rest of it in his pocket. “Listen, Petey, mind if I join you?”

“You mean like, at church?”

“Yeah. It's been a while for me and you seem like a sign from the Big Guy or whatever.”

Peter stared. He had never been into the proselytizing part of Christianity, although sometimes he wondered if spreading the Good Word wouldn't help absolve him of some of his guilt. The fact that, suddenly, a man he'd met one time was asking to join him at mass...well, it was like an opportunity falling into his lap.

“Yeah, sure, we can...we can just, I mean, it's right up this way.”

Peter shoved his hands more deeply into his pockets and started again towards the church. Even though he knew Wade was going to come, it still felt surprising when the man fell into step beside Peter.

“So, what are we, Presbyterian? Evangelical? Methodist?” Wade said excitedly, rubbing his hands together. “Oh, wait, are we going to this big Catholic place just up the street? Our Lady of the Lake?”

“Our Lady of Angels,” Peter corrected.

“Dope,” Wade simply said, keeping pace with Peter.

They walked in relative silence until they got within sight of the massive building. There were some pretty impressive churches in New York, but Our Lady of Angels was certainly one of the churches that stood out. And, true enough to its design, Peter did feel some sense of wonder and of reverence when he was inside it. The way the sunlight filtered in through the stained glass, the way that the statues were carved with such intricate detail...it made him feel something.

Wade grabbed the large, carved handle on the oak door and pulled it open. It always took Peter a couple of tugs, because the door was so heavy, but Wade swung it open like it was no problem. Peter tried not to think about the way the man's muscles were probably moving under his jacket. He was, after all, going into the House of God.

Inside, Peter led Wade up the marble-cut stairs and they pattered over the tile floor into the nave. Wade's neck craned backward to take in the vaulted ceiling. Peter couldn't help but smile a little; he liked to look back at the carved marble above when he had the chance, too.

As he'd anticipated, there were already some people packed in the first few pews, with a sprinkling of others throughout the church. Some people didn't like to sit near the front, and Peter could resonate with that. His and Ben's pew had pretty consistently been the tenth one back – near enough to the front to feel involved, but not so close that he'd be staring down the priest the whole time. Besides, the best view of the ceiling was somewhere about halfway back.

Peter debated about sitting in his and Ben's pew, which he'd been avoiding for the last five months. Now, with Wade in tow, it didn't feel so awful to sidle in. He sat against the edge of the pew, next to the center aisle.

Immediately, Wade grabbed the hymnal in front of him and started leafing through it. Peter's stomach twisted anxiously – that had been the hymnal that Uncle Ben had always used. It had a dog-ear about fifty pages in that made it stand out among the others. Peter had dog-eared it, on Uncle Ben's favorite song, which was “How Can I Keep From Singing?” He watched as Wade flipped the hymnal open to the page. Peter's eyes fell on his favorite verse, which he didn't think was part of the original, but that the hymnal had added anyway:

 

_I lift my eyes, the cloud grows thin,_

_I see the blue above it._

_And day by day, this pathway smooths_

_Since first I learned to love it._

 

Then, from the first row of the church, Peter heard a few people start speaking. He could hear the faint “Hail Mary, full of grace...” growing in intensity until the few dozen people in the pews were all speaking in unison. Peter dipped his hand into his pocket and fished out his rosary, a red one that he knew had been his mother's. He pressed the first bead between his pointer finger and thumb and started mumbling the prayer with everyone else. Wade closed the hymnal and put it back into the wooden shelf it belonged on, then stared at Peter.

“So you're like... _really_ Catholic, huh?” Wade whispered. Peter pointedly didn't answer.

The mass started on-time, it went off without a hitch, and when it came time for communion, Wade respectfully stayed seated in his pew. He must have known that it was frowned upon to receive communion if he wasn't Catholic. When Peter stood up and queued to get to the front, he felt the eyes of some of the congregation on him. He could feel them wanting to know who the scarred, hulking man was that he'd come in with, especially since he'd been coming alone for the last five months.

That was why, after the priest dismissed everyone and the recessional hymn started, Peter grabbed Wade by the sleeve and ushered him out of the pew. There were a few disapproving looks, but he was relieved to get out onto the sidewalk, where it was already dark and the air was biting cold.

“You like to leave early?” Wade mused as they walked towards the movie theater.

“What? No, that wasn't early. Early is when you leave right after communion. Everybody gives you a look if you do that.”

“You still got a few looks, if you ask me.”

Peter scoffed. “That's because they wanted to know who you are.”

“Why didn't you let them ask?”

For a long moment, Peter didn't answer, and surprisingly, Wade didn't rush him. The truth was, he wasn't quite sure why he hadn't stayed to explain. After all, if he had allowed Wade to follow him to church because it was him doing his Christian duty and spreading the Word of God, then wouldn't he want other people to know that he was doing it? It would have made sense, except Peter wasn't quite sure that he had allowed Wade to come simply because it was a version of proselytizing. Maybe he'd let Wade come because he needed the company.

“It wasn't any of their business,” Peter answered finally.

They passed by the movie theater, and while Peter expected Wade to break off then, the man kept walking with him. Perhaps he should have felt threatened, but there was nothing threatening about Wade, somehow. He'd find a place to ditch him before they got to his apartment, for sure, but for now, he didn't mind Wade's presence.

While they were walking, specks of snowflakes started down on them out of the black sky. Peter shivered in his jacket and eyed the coffee shop that they were passing.

“Want to stop?” Wade offered, seeing Peter's gaze.

“Yeah. I'm freezing.”

They veered off into the coffee shop and Wade prompted Peter to grab a table. He expected Wade to order his own coffee and then trade off as table-saver, but when Peter went to get up, Wade caught his arm. “I got yours.”

“What? Why?”

“Because you took me to church, so now I'm showing my appreciation.”

Peter furrowed his brow. “But what did you get me?”

“A grande soy caramel latte with no whip,” Wade answered casually, as though he had no question that his order had been spot-on. Peter stared. He'd never really had a decadent coffee – he'd just started drinking it black, sharing the pot with May since he started high school.

Of course, the latte was delicious. Peter emerged from his long draw with foam on his lip. Wade grinned across the table at him.

“So have you been Catholic all your life?”

“Hmm? Oh, yeah. My parents were Catholic.”

The second he said it, he realized that he'd opened the door for more questions. Wade hadn't known why Peter wasn't with his parents at the movies, or why he wasn't with his parents at church, but he'd basically offered the explanation up on a silver platter. “Were?” Wade pointed out.

Peter closed his eyes for a moment to collect himself. “Yeah, they um. Passed away, about five years ago.”

“Where did you go?”

Peter blinked. Wade hadn't responded with all the typical replies he got when he explained that his parents were dead. Usually, people peppered him with “Oh, I'm sorry,” and “That must be difficult,” and “That's horrible,” but Wade skipped over all the pleasantries like they were an unnecessary show. “I, uh, went to live with my aunt and uncle. You might have seen my aunt at the movies the other day.”

“Your uncle doesn't like movies?”

“He's...he also passed away. Six months ago.”

“Shit, kid. How old are you?” Wade said incredulously.

“Fifteen.”

“Shit. You're so young. When life decides to fuck you, it fucks you good, am I right?” Wade leaned against the back of the chair and blew out a long breath. “And here I was, thinking I was a sob story.”

It was hard to tell whether Wade was fishing for Peter to ask about what had happened to the man to constitute his life as a “sob story,” but it didn't matter whether he was fishing. Peter was genuinely interested. “Why is that?”

“Well,” Wade began, putting down his latte (and that in itself should have been indicative of the enormity of what Wade was about to say), “I fell in love with a sex worker, I popped her the question, and that very night I was diagnosed with cancer, and not like, the Stage 1 kind, but the kill-you-in-a-few-weeks kind, and then I was recruited into a secret program that tortured people like me on the off-chance we'd mutate into a superhero, and then I totally did, but it fucked up my face and really my whole body, and then I was too scared to go back to my fiancee, and then a guy tried to kill her, and then a guy really DID kill her, and we're not really following the whole canon here, so that's pretty much where my story ends, at the moment.” Both of Wade's hands were in the air, since he'd started off tallying his misfortunes on his fingers, but run out and just started gesturing animatedly. “Then I went to a movie to see a comedy, ended up seeing a drama, and decided to laugh anyway. So I met you.”

Peter bit his lip. “Am I part of the train wreck of your life now?”

Wade's brown eyes squinted at Peter from across the table, as though he wasn't sure whether Peter were real. “What, I just told you I'm a superhero and the thing you ask me is whether you're part of my life now?”

“I guess so.” The knowledge that Wade was a superhero, or at least that he had some kind of special ability, didn't really surprise Peter so much as he'd expected. After all, he'd been somewhere around eight years old when he first saw Iron Man in person, and since then, superheroes had basically become the norm. He supposed the chances of meeting one on the street weren't so horrible.

Wade gave Peter a curious look and took another long sip of his latte. “You know, I like you, Peter. You have a certain aura about you, I think.”

“Is that your superpower? Seeing auras?”

Wade laughed, short and genuinely amused. “No.”

Peter felt his phone buzz in his pocket. He supposed that it was Aunt May, wondering where he was after church, but for some reason, he wasn't in a hurry to leave.

“You know, I hope you don't take this in a weird way, but I really respect people who have a sense of faith in their lives. I'm an atheist myself, but I always get a big kick out of seeing the sincerity on truly spiritual people's faces when they're praying. It's like, you think you can move the universe, or something. And I respect that.”

“If you're atheist, why did you come to church with me?”

Wade shrugged. “Like I said, personal interest in the people. But for you in particular, I think you're just so opposite of me, I wanted to know more. Like, when I was fifteen, I was not exactly the kind of kid who would be walking to church on a Saturday evening. Hell, I'd probably call it a good night if I ordered Chinese food, beat my meat to a porno, and binge-drank to the point of _almost_ throwing up on my homework.”

The image of Wade, smooth-skinned still, young like Peter, getting off to porn in a generic bedroom in New York, seemed to swim into Peter's brain and swirl there. He gripped the cardboard cup in his hand, trying not to think about what Wade would have looked like, spread out on his mattress, touching himself to a video.

Wade squinted at him again. “Sorry, kid, I'm probably too vulgar. You look a bit flushed. Just let me know if you want me to shut my mouth.”

“No, no, it's just...yeah, I don't really....” Peter trailed off, feeling his blush deepen in his cheeks. God, he was already half-hard in his pants.

The man sitting across from him waited for a moment for Peter to continue, but when it was clear that Peter didn't have it in him, his eyes slowly grew wider. “Wait, do you mean that you never get off? Is that what they teach you at church?”

The person sitting at the table behind them looked over her shoulder; one of the baristas giggled. Peter suddenly felt very hot. “Um, look, could we not...you know, talk about it? It's kind of weird.”

Wade held up his hands. “Yeah, sure. And I know it's probably gross of me to be a fully-grown man saying that kind of stuff in front of a fifteen-year-old that I just met.”

“A bit.”

“But,” Wade continued, and Peter felt his face get redder, if it was even possible, “let me just say something quick. If you don't want to do it, for your own personal reasons, I can get behind that. I fully support that. But if you're not doing it because you think you're going to go to hell for it, let me tell you one thing. I've met a lot of very, very bad people. And heck, I've even been dead. You – the most innocence kid I've ever met – are not going to whatever Bad Place may be just because you get your jollies off once in a while, okay? If anything, it's healthy.”

Wade ended his statement with a firm fist to the table, and Peter jumped a little in his seat. His face felt like it was burning with embarrassment, and he was pretty sure that he'd already started dripping in his boxers. “I. Okay, I...” he stuttered. His brain had completely shorted out.

“Plus, I mean, guys your age are constantly getting a hard-on. I'll tell you from experience, abstinence does not help that.”

He couldn't take it anymore. Here he was, getting talked to about boners by a stranger who had somehow worked his way into Peter's fantasies, and he had an erection that felt hot and aching in his pants. Peter buried his face in his hands. “Okay,” he warned, his voice muffled by his palms. “You can stop now.”

“Hey,” Wade said softly, but Peter didn't look up. “Hey, I'm sorry, sometimes I'm a dumb-ass and I don't know when to stop. You gonna be all right?”

“Um. Yeah, probably in a minute or two,” Peter managed. He pressed his eyes against his fingers, wanting to evaporate.

Wade paused, then Peter heard him sip his latte. “Hey, take your time, Petey.” The affectionate nickname did absolutely nothing to assuage his erection. Instead, Peter trained his focus on how pissed Aunt May would probably be when he showed up at home a half-hour later than he'd said he would. After a solid two or three minutes, he finally felt like he could raise his eyes.

Wade was looking at him intently, his scarred chin resting on the plastic lid of his cup.

“Um,” Peter said quietly, his voice sounding destroyed somehow, “I should probably get going.”

Although he looked disappointed, Wade nodded. “Scared you off?”

“No, I just – my aunt is going to be waiting...”

Wade held up his hand again, and Peter went silent. “Let me just give you my phone number. Not in a creepy way, I swear,” he said hastily at Peter's expression. “Just in case you ever want to talk, about anything. Being a teenager is tough, and you don't sound like you've got it easy by any means. So, you know, if you ever want to get another coffee. Or go to mass.” After digging around in his pocket for a pen, Wade grabbed a table napkin and scribbled his number on it. He passed it across the table to Peter. “And I'm not going to ask for your number, okay? You just use this however you want to. I mean it.”

Peter pulled the napkin toward him and folded it up into his hand. “Okay.” He contemplated saying something else, but he had no idea what else to say. Instead, he stood up.

“See you around, Peter.”

“Okay.” And then he left, only to sneak a peak back through the warm window, and see Wade stand up to throw away his cup, garnering side looks and whispers at the state of his skin.

When Peter unlocked his apartment door, face pink with the cold, shoes wet with the light snow that had been falling, Aunt May lectured him about not coming straight home. Of course, he only told her that he'd stopped for coffee, not that he'd done it all with Wade. Despite how cold it was outside, he felt warm all over.

 

~~~

 

That night, his Bibles, the Catechism of the Catholic Church, the Catholic Book of Prayers, and all of his notebooks were stored on his shelf.

He stared at the underside of the top bunk.

Did Wade have a point? Was he concerned about masturbating because he felt like it was really harmful to him? Or was he just overwhelmed with guilt, with the concern of God's disapproval, with the death of Uncle Ben? Was all of his guilt accumulating so much that he didn't even know what the guilt was for anymore?

Outside on the street below, an emergency vehicle zoomed by, its siren calling out a warning to cars. Inside Peter's bedroom, red and blue lights flashed across his walls. It was almost reminiscent of the stained glass in the church.

The priest's words from his confession seemed stuck in his head. _Deriving pleasure like that is using the gift of your sexuality for the wrong reasons. It's important to remember that your body is for a greater purpose, and masturbation is abusing your own body. Removing this sin from your life will bring you closer to God._

“Except it hasn't,” Peter whispered.

All it had done was make him feel like he didn't deserve forgiveness. All it had done was make him write Hail Mary's in his notebook and hang white towels in the bathroom.

Wade had said that he was the most innocent kid he'd ever met. If only Wade knew how guilty Peter felt.

“Fuck it.” The harsh words were foreign in his mouth, but his stiffening dick in his hand felt all too familiar.

And somehow, there was Wade in his mind, speaking to him in that low voice. Honeyed. Wanting Peter as much as Peter wanted him. “Hey, Petey. Everything's okay. You're beautiful.”

Peter whimpered into the back of his hand. The other hand was sticky on his sensitive skin, and yet he was becoming painfully hard. At the first drop of precum, he smeared it down his shaft, sighing at the slick feeling of his hand stroking himself.

In his mind, Wade settled down on the bed beside him. “You're doing so good, Petey. So good. Does it feel good?”

“Yes,” Peter hissed. God, he hadn't come in forever – it had even been a solid week since he'd had a wet dream. He was leaking copiously onto his own tense stomach muscles. “Please, don't stop.”

“Wouldn't dream of it, baby boy,” Wade whispered in his ear, and suddenly the hand on his cock wasn't his own, but Wade's. “I want you to be happy. You deserve to be happy. You deserve to feel good.” He could almost feel the scars that would rib Wade's fingers, running the length of his dick.

Peter's cock jumped, sensitive and aching in his hand. He could already tell he wasn't going to last long. “I – I can't – ”

“Shh, Petey,” Wade cooed. “You're fine. You're so good. You don't need to feel guilty about this.”

“I...” His voice seemed caught in his throat. He could feel his abs tightening. He could feel his balls tightening, too. “I'm gonna...”

And then he opened his mouth, as if in a silent yell, and dug his head into the pillow as he arched his back into his orgasm. He pulsed into his own hand, warm, hot fluid that made him dizzy with pleasure. Wade, in his fantasy, was there beside him, coming too, his scarred face buried in Peter's neck.

Peter kept his eyes closed for just a moment longer, letting the aftershocks shiver through him. Then, he opened his eyes.

He was, of course, alone in his room.

Yet unlike the times he'd masturbated before, there was sense of something new settling into his body. Almost like a floating sensation.

Peter consciously tried not to feel filthy as he cleaned himself up with tissues from his bedside stand. Part of him wanted to find his journal, scribble his penance into the pages until his hand hurt. The other part of him wanted to never write another Hail Mary in his life.

He settled for a middle ground. When all the tissues were thrown into the waste basket, Peter pulled the covers back over himself and turned onto his side.

Instead of praying for Mary's intercession, instead of apologizing to God, Peter closed his eyes and whispered to the person he knew was looking out for him, always, without judgment.

“I lift my eyes, the cloud grows thin. I see the blue above it. And day by day, this pathway smooths, since first I learned to love it.”

 

 


End file.
